The Canadian government has pledged $ 4.9 billion over six years to help the United States upgrade NORAD’s mainland defenses and meet the growing threat posed by supersonic missiles and advanced cruise missile technology developed by Russia. and China. Secretary of Defense Anita Anand announced the investment in the Canadian Forces base in Trenton on Monday, offering a first look at exactly how Canada and the United States plan to modernize North America’s Air Defense Command and replace Warning. This joint US-Canadian radar system includes dozens of locations from the Yukon to Labrador and its job is to detect air threats, initially large-scale bombers. Defense experts say the spending commitment, nine days before the NATO leader’s summit in Madrid, appears to be an attempt to create the impression that Canada is spending more money on the military. Canada has come under pressure from allies, particularly the United States, to increase its military spending to 2% of annual economic output, from 1.33 percent today. Ms Anand said Canada and the United States were building a new “Northern Approaches” surveillance system that would eventually replace the North Warning System. This will include state-of-the-art technology, called over-the-horizon radar, which has a much longer detection range – as well as thousands of miles away. The new facility will include an “Arctic Over-the-Horizon Radar” to provide early warning radar coverage and threat monitoring from the Canada-US border to the Arctic Circle. The second component will be a “Polar Over-the-Horizon Radar” system that will provide the same coverage and surveillance across and beyond the northernmost approaches to North America, including Canada’s Arctic archipelago. A third piece will be a new network called Crossbow, which consists of sensors with what Ms. Anand calls “classified capabilities” that will be located across northern Canada to provide another level of detection. One last item will be a space surveillance system that will use satellites to gather information and monitor threats, he told reporters. Ms Anand did not provide a timetable for the delivery of these projects, and while she said the full bill in Canada would be $ 40 billion in 20 years, the Canadian government has not announced budget commitments of more than $ 4.9 billion. The danger that Canada and the United States have in mind is advances in missile technology in Russia and China that could send non-nuclear warheads much longer distances with much greater accuracy. These include supersonic missiles, which travel extremely fast and can dodge and weave in flight to avoid interception, as well as next-generation cruise missiles that can travel close to the ground. Last fall, a senior U.S. general warned a Halifax security forum that China and Russia had overtaken the United States in developing supersonic missiles – considered by some to be the first strike weapons. General David Thompson, vice president of space operations for the United States Space Force, said the world had become a “much more complex place” with the advent of supersonic rockets that could change course. This means that, unlike ballistic missiles, a target country cannot quickly predict where such missiles will land. The aging North Warning System, which is supposed to detect incoming threats to North America, is incapable of responding effectively to modern missile technology, lawmakers have warned. Ms Anand said the North Warnings System would remain active until the new technology package was implemented. He did not give a timetable for this.
